February 4

Dillon:

I saw great progress during this lesson! Dillon was throwing a little spook at you in Rowland, but you did a great job of learning how to cope. His mentality and breeding make him a little hotter like this, so you can expect that tiny issues like this may crop up in unfamiliar environments like a show, so knowing how to deal with it (in a classy, subtle manner) is an EXCELLENT skill!

I saw your efforts to correct the impulsion behind were much faster - before I could say it, I saw that you'd developed the feel in order to correct it yourself. This is AWESOME, because chances are I can't talk fast enough to tell you when you need to do it anyway - a correction aid two strides late isn't very effective.

We started to make the shoulder in really work for you in this lesson. By staying off the track, the outside hind had to keep working. I made you think about that outside hind by asking for a little bit of shoulder-in to half-pass at the walk. I did this INSTEAD of the haunches-in because he will tend to use this as an evasion in the canter, and we'd rather him be shoulder-fore or even straight in order to strengthen him from behind.

As far as the canter work, the last few minutes were where I saw the best canter (go figure - this is normal for this stage of training though!). You did a better job of ensuring that he kept his frame in the up transition, but be sure that once you KNOW he's taking the lead, ask him for an extended canter. REALLY exaggerate it! He's willing to give you one OR the other; the frame or a ground covering stride. You want both. Don't be afraid to ask for it! If he pulls, we talked about an effective half halt through the shoulder blades to correct it.

Dillon also tends to fall into his down transitions, and give up when he comes into the walk. Training him early to truly respect what you're asking for is important. Correcting him with a -tap tap- if he wants to be rude about yanking - we can't have him ripping the reins away in the middle of a free walk, or when you try and pick him back up!

This was a great lesson, and you two both worked hard but accomplished a lot!